ReNew Energy Global - Q1 2025
August 16, 2024
Transcript
Operator (participant)
Thank you for standing by, and welcome to the ReNew 1Q FY 2025 earnings report. All participants are in listen-only mode. There will be a presentation followed by a question-and-answer session. If you wish to ask a question, you will need to press the star key followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. I will now hand the conference over to Mr. Nathan Judge. Please go ahead.
Nathan Judge (Head of Investor Relations)
Yeah, thank you, and good morning, everyone, and thank you for joining us. We put out a press release last night announcing our results for the fiscal year first quarter 2025, ending June 30th, 2024 and a copy of the release and the earnings presentation are available on the Investor Relations section of the ReNew's website at www.renew.com.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
With me today are Sumant Sinha, Founder, Chairman, and CEO, Kailash Vaswani, our CFO, Vaishali Nigam Sinha, Co-founder and Chairperson of Sustainability, and Anunay Shahi, SVP, Corporate Finance and Investor Relations. After the prepared remarks, which we expect will take a half hour, we'll open the call for questions. Please note, our Safe Harbor statements are contained within our press release, presentation materials, and materials available on our website. These statements are important and integral to all our remarks.
There are risks and uncertainties that could cause our results to differ materially from those expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. So we encourage you to review the press release we furnish in our 6-K and the presentation on our website for a more complete description.
Also contained in our press release, presentation materials, and annual report are certain non-IFRS measures that we reconcile to the most comparable IFRS measure, and these reconciliations are also available on our website in the press release, presentation materials, our annual report, and our Form 20-F. It is now my pleasure to hand it over to Sumant, who has been recently appointed as the co-chair of Alliance of CEO Climate Leaders.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Yeah, thank you, Nathan. Good morning, everyone, and glad to have you all on our earnings call of today. Last quarter, we had a slightly different format where we talked about our long-term outlook and our vision. I thank all of our investors and stakeholders who appreciated the effort and clarity on the long-term vision.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
Turning to page five of the presentation, last year, we kickstarted our journey of doubling our operating portfolio by 2029 by winning more than 8GW in auctions. Of these wins, we have already converted 2.2GW into PPAs, with the majority expected to be converted over the next few months. While we pursue this growth, we will continue to be focused on shareholder value creation, accessing only the cheapest sources of capital and exploring avenues wherein the returns are materially above our cost of capital.
Our recent auction wins are expected to generate returns higher than the historical average, and we expect the trend to continue given the robustness of the auction market. We also recently filed our annual 20-F for fiscal 2024, wherein we are in compliance with SOX requirements. In addition, we are also steadfast in our ESG commitments, and our debut integrated report is a testament to the standards that we benchmark ourselves against.
In fiscal 2025, we expect several of the unsigned PPAs to be signed, providing us with an even clearer path beyond the current 15.6GW committed portfolio, along with full clarity on execution timelines. Furthermore, given the terms at which we have secured the pipeline, our lower module prices, supply chain security, as well as given our conservative assumptions, we expect to generate better returns on the current pipeline of projects than the ones that we have executed to date.
Moreover, we will continue to be disciplined and highly selective in our approach towards bidding for future growth, and we look to secure projects with a lower risk and higher return profile. We reiterate our FY 2025 guidance as well as our longer-term outlook. We have already commissioned almost 500MW of capacity this financial year and are well advanced on many other construction projects.
Finally, safety is of utmost priority to us, and it has been deeply embedded in our culture since day one. As a testament to that commitment and focus, we were recently awarded a five-star safety rating by the British Safety Council for one of our projects.
Turning to page 7, we have come a long way in 12 years by constructing 10GW. What took us 12 years for the first 10GW, we intend to repeat in less than 5 years for the next 10GW. There have been some learnings that we intend to implement in our future portfolio.
Firstly, our thesis of having an in-house team for EPC, O&M, and digital platforms has provided us with significant differentiation vis-à-vis others, where we not only save on costs, but the turnaround time for our projects is lower than most peers. Do keep in mind that wind, which is a lot harder to execute, is approximately 50% of our delivered megawatts, which means that we have done so with a higher degree of difficulty than others who have been largely focused on solar.
Keep also in mind that wind CapEx is almost double that of solar CapEx. So every one megawatt of wind is, from a capital standpoint, more than one megawatt of solar. Secondly, when we took the decision to get into manufacturing, we received some strong feedback about it. However, today it has become a significant competitive advantage for us. As the government of India has implemented ALMM, we have a secure source of modules. The availability of modules at the right cost is becoming a key differentiator in the Indian renewables landscape.
Finally, our capital discipline, as well as our ability to access the cheapest and most diverse sources of capital, both for equity and debt, differentiates us from others. Turning to page 8, execution is a top priority and a key differentiator for us. We have executed 2GW of capacity over the last 12 months, and reiterate our execution guidance of 1.9-2.4GW for fiscal FY 2025.
Year to date, we have executed approximately 500MW, including 400MW of a solar SECI project, and have received COD approvals for all of the projects that were pre-COD at the time of fiscal 2024 earnings. In addition, we have over 600MW of capacity that is in the advanced stages of completion and will enable us to hit our construction targets.
We signed 2.2GW of PPA during quarter one, FY 2025, and continue to be optimistic about signing the majority of the PPAs from our current pipeline in the current fiscal year. Our module manufacturing continues to scale up, and our module supply is now fully met from our own manufacturing facilities. The Jaipur facility will produce more than 2GW of modules this year, while the Gujarat facility is already operational and should be ramped up fully by the end of the year.
We have also started to secure external sales contracts for module supply, and we currently have contracted to sell around 600MW this financial year. These contracts will ensure that our surplus capacity is put to good use and will enable a faster return on capital deployed. Now, let me hand it over to Kailash to talk more about the finance strategy. Thank you.
Kailash Vaswani (CFO)
Thank you, Sumant. As can be seen on slide 10, we continue to deliver consistent growth. Since the same time last year, we have constructed over 2GW of projects, a near 24% increase in operating capacity after adjusting for 400MW sold during the year. While there has been a 24% increase in operating megawatts, I would like to remind you that our EBIT, our adjusted EBITDA last year benefited from late payment surcharges, which was absent this quarter, and will continue to fade away as we have largely received most of our LPS that were due to us, and all our customers are currently paying their bills on time.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
In addition, we sold 400MW during the year, which contributed to last year's EBITDA. Lastly, this quarter, we saw slightly lower PLFs, and that impacted our revenues by about INR 1.3 billion. We have seen a recovery in the weather in July, which was about 10%-15% better than last year. To conclude, while there was almost INR 3.9 billion increase in revenue due to higher megawatts, our adjusted EBITDA increased by only about INR 400 million due to all these factors.
Moving on to slide 11. The leverage at the operating asset level continues to be well below the 6x threshold that we have set. On a trailing 12-month basis, the leverage was around 5.7x, excluding our under construction portfolio, contribution from JV partners in the form of CCDs and our manufacturing and transmission businesses. The 5.7x leverage is after taking into account that we commissioned a large capacity of 650MW in the last month of the previous year, for which the EBITDA contribution has been only for a single quarter.
The debt related to our manufacturing and transmission business does not contribute to our adjusted EBITDA, but it does provide us a competitive edge for our business. As we continue to grow our portfolio, the proportion of under construction projects as a percentage of overall portfolio should come down and will improve the ratios, in addition to our efforts to be disciplined in our approach towards capital deployment. Let me hand it over to Vaishali for comments on ESG.
Vaishali Nigam Sinha (Chairperson of Sustainability)
Thank you, Kailash. We are delighted to present ReNew's inaugural Annual Integrated Report for fiscal year 2023-2024. This is a testament to our commitment to exceeding GRI reporting standards and advancing global transparency. With the release of our integrated report, ReNew has achieved its several firsts, setting new benchmarks in our ESG vision, performance, and transparency, which I will elaborate in the coming slides.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
The Annual Integrated Report has been crafted in alignment with IIRC, GRI, SASB, UNGC, among others. The financial and the non-financial parameters for fiscal year 2023-2024 have been externally assured by S.R. Batliboi and Company and EY LLP, respectively.
Turning to page 13, showcasing the key performance highlights for fiscal year 2023-2024. In fiscal year3023-2024, ReNew has made significant strides in its ESG efforts, showcasing a strong commitment to safety, sustainability, and social responsibility.
We successfully avoided 16 million tons of GHG emissions, reflecting a 15% year-on-year increase, and saved 358,000 cubic meters of water, marking a 13% improvement. Our operation sourced 41% of electricity from clean sources, and we achieved carbon neutrality for Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions for the fourth consecutive year. Through our socioeconomic programs, we positively impacted over 475,000 lives with a CSR spending of INR 240 million.
Our workforce reflects a 14% gender diversity rate, with women representing 10% of STEM roles. We maintained a lost time injury frequency rate of 0.22, and all our suppliers were assessed against ESG criteria. Turning to page 14, highlighting the key features of ReNew's inaugural integrated report. With the release of ReNew's annual integrated report, led to incorporation of key value additions.
To mention, the value creation, framework impactfully showcasing the inputs, business model, outputs, and outcomes. Also laid a special emphasis on the robust corporate governance and risk management framework at ReNew, by listing our risk identified and mitigation strategies adopted.
Moving to page 15, preparation of integrated report led to many firsts at ReNew, namely the very important double materiality, a two-pillar system with a core set of shared disclosures that place each pillar on an equal footing, and includes both financial and impact materiality under one roof for economic and sustainability reporting, and our effort to identify environmentally sustainable economic activities and to support sustainable investment. We voluntarily aligned ourselves with the EU Taxonomy, making us one of the first few Indian companies in the sector to do so.
Turning to slide 16, we would now like to highlight our special initiatives for fiscal year 2023-2024. Our flagship programs, Lighting Lives, an initiative focused on last-mile electrification of schools with less than three hours of electricity through solar energy, electrified 183 schools, established 119 digital learning centers. Women for Climate, an important part of our programs, our socioeconomic empowerment program focused on building climate resilience, where we have trained 350 women salt farmers.
On the site, some of the specific initiatives we have undertaken are programs led by our employees, that is ReNewers, ensuring sustainable, equitable, and responsible growth. We have an annual volunteering campaign, which covers most of our sites and ReNewers. We provide safe drinking water by building 223 water tanks, desilting 22 lakes.
Our Gift for Warmth program, which is also another flagship program recognized by our Honorable President of India, where we distributed 836,000 blankets across the countries where it does get quite cold, donating rice to the needy, and contributing towards a hunger-free India, where we distributed about 143 kilos of rice across our sites and in the country. Let me now hand it over to Kailash to talk about our guidance.
Kailash Vaswani (CFO)
Thank you, Vaishali. I just wanted to end by re-emphasizing that there has never been a better time to be in Indian renewables from a market opportunity, returns, and capital deployment perspective. Coming to our guidance, while we had around INR 1.3 billion impact from weather this quarter, we saw the trend reverse in July and makes us confident that we will deliver on our annual EBITDA guidance.Hence, we are reaffirming our megawatts and long-term guidance as well.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
Do note that historically, our Q2 numbers have been about 10%-15% higher than Q1, and we should see a similar trend in Q2, subject to weather conditions and adjustments related to LPS and projects sold. With that, we will be happy to take questions.
Operator (participant)
Thank you. If you wish to ask a question, please press star one on your telephone and wait for your name to be announced. If you wish to cancel your request, please press star two. If you're on a speakerphone, please pick up your handset to ask your question. Your first question comes from Justin Clare with Roth Capital Partners.
Justin Clare (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)
Hi, thanks for taking the question. Wanted to start off here, you know, you had indicated that you've contracted, I think, 600MW of external module sales. Was wondering if you could talk about the potential revenue and margin profile for those sales, the anticipated timing of recognition, and then if you could share, is that with a customer within India, or have you looked to markets outside of India for selling those modules?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Kailash, you wanna take that?
Kailash Vaswani (CFO)
Yeah, sure. So, Justin, thanks for your question. So these are customers, you know, within India, to secure some of these module supplies. And, again, you know, we are not disclosing the details of that in terms of pricing and all, but these are accretive in terms of overall margins, and would add to the EBITDA of the company as we go forward.
Justin Clare (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)
Okay, got it. And then, so you have commissioned, you know, portions of the RTC and Peak Power project here. Was wondering if you could just update us on the performance that you're seeing for the commissioned portions of those projects? How does it compare to your expectations? And then how do you feel about meeting the requirements under those PPAs?
Kailash Vaswani (CFO)
At this point in time, you know, we have commissioned parts of it, and we are not selling it under the PPA, because the full system isn't ready. So right now, all the sales are happening through the merchant market, but we are seeing attractive realizations on whatever we are selling in the merchant market, better than our base case.
Justin Clare (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)
Okay. Okay, got it. And then maybe just one more. Just how are you thinking about asset recycling this year? Are there particular projects that you're in the market with looking to monetize? And just what's the potential to see an asset sale in fiscal 2025 year?
Kailash Vaswani (CFO)
So again, it's gonna be very opportunistic, Justin. Right now, you know, we have a few discussions going on, and, you know, when there's a requirement of capital, you know, currently asset recycling is offering us the lowest cost capital. So we'll be disciplined about it, and, you know, to meet our requirements, you know, we may monetize some assets.
Justin Clare (Managing Director and Senior Research Analyst)
Okay, I appreciate it. Thank you.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Thank you, Justin.
Operator (participant)
Your next question comes from Maheep Mandloi with Mizuho.
Maheep Mandloi (Equity Research of Renewables and Clean Energy)
Hey, hello there. Thanks for taking the questions here, but maybe just following up on Justin's question on the module sales, could you just talk about the timing of that 600MW of something you kind of like planned to do this fiscal year or next? And could we kind of think of that as a programmatic just look at the production and your needs and everything else, kind of assuming that it's sold in the Indian markets?
Kailash Vaswani (CFO)
Yeah. So in terms of timing, you know, it's gonna be a function of, you know, the production cycle that we are following. Most of it is gonna be back-ended towards the end of this financial year, and some part of it will slip into the next financial year also. So that's where it is. And again, you know, we have set up this entire capacity for our captive requirements. So largely, we would prioritize that to meet our IPP solar business requirements.
And, you know, if there's an opportunistic play there in terms of better margins, but then we may look to sell some of these modules to third-party customers. Again, you know, we - it's early days, so we are not really giving any guidance on that till we, you know, stabilize on terms of what our requirements are likely to be and how much surplus we will have, you know, and what opportunities are available to monetize that.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Kailash, if I just add to that. Sorry, sorry, Maheep.
Maheep Mandloi (Equity Research of Renewables and Clean Energy)
Yep.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
If I may just add to that, answered by Kailash. The you know, if you look at how much we are gonna be producing this year in terms of setting up project capacity of solar and how much we have in terms of production capacity on the manufacturing side, I think it's fairly clear that we will be selling, you know, some amount into the market on a regular basis going forward.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
The only thing is it depends obviously on when our requirements are versus when the production will be happening. But we should assume that there will be a you know, a chunk of sale that will happen from our manufacturing business into the market. And just for you to know, there are two kinds of sales.
Obviously, there are pure module sales only, and then there are module sales along with cells. And those have different realizations, given the supply-demand for modules and supply demand for cells. And so that's really, I think, how you should think about it.
Maheep Mandloi (Equity Research of Renewables and Clean Energy)
Got it. And just on that, like, are you seeing any interest from other markets outside of India?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Yeah, we are seeing interest. At this point, you know, we are waiting for our cell plant to get commissioned, which will happen later this financial year. And then, of course, there'll be a period of stabilizing. And I think once all of that is done, then we will be in a position to start supplying cells into the markets, any markets, either the domestic content requirement market in India, or the export market. So I would imagine that will probably start happening from next financial year onwards sometime.
Maheep Mandloi (Equity Research of Renewables and Clean Energy)
Got it. And just maybe one small, modeling question, around housekeeping. The, DSO, increased a little bit this quarter. I think last quarter, we're expecting it to be flatter or down. Is this Telangana or, anything else kind of impacting that?
Kailash Vaswani (CFO)
So it's mostly just a quarterly distribution, because, you know, the quarter one, you know, revenues were a little lesser compared to what the receivables were. So that's why the ratios are a little bit higher, but it's nothing significant.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
So I would say, Maheep, also, there is typically--there is also typically a seasonality in our receivables, because billing starts to go up quite substantially in the high wind months, and the receivables tend to come in on a more even basis.
Maheep Mandloi (Equity Research of Renewables and Clean Energy)
Got it. So it seems more seasonality, not any changes and...
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
No, not really.
Maheep Mandloi (Equity Research of Renewables and Clean Energy)
Got you. Got it. I'll jump back in the queue here. Thanks.
Operator (participant)
Your next question comes from Angie Storozynski with Seaport.
Angie Storozynski (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
Thank you. So my first question is about the wind PLFs coming week. And I understand that there is some weather variations. But I'm wondering, in the U.S., we're having more and more examples of issues with wind turbines, onshore wind turbines. I'm just wondering if the underperformance of your wind assets has anything to do with any equipment issues, or is it just the weather?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
It's just the weather, Angie. There is no wind turbine performance issue. In fact, our performance of wind turbines has been as per our expectation across all regions, across all the turbine models that we have. And, you know, we have turbines from various different suppliers, both Indian and international. So we haven't seen any systemic issue there. It's just really been the wind.
Angie Storozynski (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
If you think about your assumptions, like, the longer-term assumptions for the wind PLFs, have you sort of tweaked them, i.e., lowered them, just to account for those, you know, relatively disappointing PLFs that we have seen over the last couple of years?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
We have done that, Angie. So for all the future forecasts and the bids that we are doing, we have significantly, you know, changed the methodology. So basically, the point is the following: that if you, you know, if you take a longer history, then the forecast for the future ends up being higher. If you take the more near-term years and base your forecast off of that, then the projection ends up being a little bit lower.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
So if you follow the traditional methodologies of using 25 years of data, you'll end up typically with a higher PLF. So we are beginning now to give a little bit more weightage to the more recent years, so that our future forecasts are more conservative than they would have been. I should also add that none of the third-party wind forecasting agencies have made that shift. So, you know, we sort of are being more conservative than where the market is right now. And even for budgeting purposes, therefore, we've reduced our year-on-year forecast as well.
Angie Storozynski (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
Okay, and then secondly, again, just a comparison to what's happening here in the US on the, on the renewable side. I mean, there's lots of discussion about, data centers and co-locations and, and renewable power feeding into, into those, you know, tech, high tech, high power tech users. Is that a phenomenon that you actually see, in India? I mean, maybe not now, but going forward, and is that, you know, the type of business that could give you premium margins for, renewable power in your build?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Yeah. So for sure, Angie, all of that is feeding into overall aggregate power demand, which is growing at 7%-8% a year in India right now. And just a word about the overall demand supply situation in the country. At this point, you know, we are not able to meet the power demand growth. So far we've had certain excess capacities on the coal side, but a lot of those capacities now have got exhausted with the demand growth that we've witnessed.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
Coal capacity additions are quite limited in India because we just don't have an EPC/equipment market that can add coal capacities beyond a certain speed. And so renewables really is the only other alternative, and which is growing at a certain pace. And until that pace steps up, you will see def...you know, deficits in the market and therefore higher merchant prices. That's really what we are seeing right now overall in the market.
Angie Storozynski (Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst)
Okay, thanks.
Operator (participant)
Your next question comes from Puneet Gulati with HSBC.
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
Yeah, thank you so much. My first question is on the solar cell capacity. Can you talk about where are you in that journey? When should we expect commissioning for the solar cell?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Yeah. So we're very close to getting it to a point of getting the first cells out. And I would say in the next few months, you should be able to or we should be able to start seeing you know the initial trial production run start. And then, of course, there'll be a period of stabilization, as you know, Puneet, because obviously, cells is a little bit more complex than modules. Our expectation is that by the end of this financial year, the cell plant will be in reasonably good shape in terms of its output. And so by next financial year, we should be able to-
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
End of this financial year.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Yeah, by the end of this financial year. So let's say in the next, as I said, next two, three months, we should start seeing the production start to happen. And then there'll be a ramp-up period, which I presume will last a few months, but certainly the production will start, you know, this year itself, this calendar year itself. And then after that, there'll be a period of stabilization and, and ramp up. And then from next financial year, we should be able to be in good shape to deliver most of the capacity.
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
Okay. And how is the transmission tie-up for the 1.5-2GW that you are looking to commission this year? Is that all tied up now?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Yeah. So, Puneet, all of our transmission. And when you say transmission, you mean, I presume, the interconnect into the grid?
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
The connectivity. Yes. Yes.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Yeah, so all of that is fully tied up, Puneet, not just for this capacity to be commissioned this year, but for our entire capacity going out for the 22GW that we have won altogether.
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
So...
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Almost for the entire capacity, our transmission and connectivity is tied up. And the important thing to note is that over and above that, we have some excess capacities that we have blocked via the mechanism that is allowed in India. So we have a few gigawatts excess over that, beyond the 20-odd gigawatts that we have won right now.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
So on the connectivity front, I think we've been very proactive about getting connectivity in the best substations. And I think a little bit underappreciated fact is that it's those connectivity applications in the better substations that will allow us to get, generate, and drive higher profitability in future projects, which we have done, I think, more proactively than a lot of other developers. Yeah.
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
Okay. So, sorry, and in terms of those transmission connectivity, are these also coming on schedule or in line with your commissioned capacity, or could there be a risk of delay, something that we experienced in the last fiscal year?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
No, so you know, the thing is that every substation, there's pretty good visibility on when the transmission contractor is likely to commission the substation. And obviously, the more near-term the commissioning date is, the more the certainty of that date being met is. And the more future out it is, the less the certainty.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
But by and large, within a three to max six months time period, for projects that are coming up for three, four years later, connectivity does tend to get done. So we're not seeing delays more than that. And of course, we are able to manage our own construction timelines to be in sync with what we are seeing happening on the transmission, you know, construction timelines.
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
Understood. That's helpful. Thank you so much, and all the best. Yeah.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Yeah, and, and for this year, we're not seeing any delays, by the way, just if that was also something that you were looking at.
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
Oh, great. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah.
Operator (participant)
Your next question comes from Uma Menon with Bernstein.
Uma Menon (Senior Research Associate)
Hi, thank you for taking my question. My question was regarding the short-term power sale that you had mentioned that happened in Q1 2025. Can you let us know if what part of it - what part of that made up the revenue or the EBITDA? Like, how much of that was a part of the revenue or the EBITDA in the quarter?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Sorry, what sale were you referring to?
Uma Menon (Senior Research Associate)
The interim power sale.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I got that. Yeah, sure. So, you know, we have in the RTC project around 400MW. And in the peak power project, we have around 300MW, which is-
Uma Menon (Senior Research Associate)
Mm-hmm.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Currently on the basis of merchant sales. I mean, the 400MW of solar, 300 in RTC, 274 in RTC, peak power is wind, and another 300 in RTC is wind. So all of this is currently on the basis of merchant; we are selling the power. In terms of the breakup of that, you know, we can circle back.
Uma Menon (Senior Research Associate)
Sure. Thank you. That's all.
Operator (participant)
Your next question comes from Amit Bhinde with Morgan Stanley.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
Hello. Yeah. Sir, my question again was on the solar module manufacturing front. So as of now, you have already sold 1GW in FY '24, internal consumption. And, with that, what is the kind of cost and realization that you are approximately seeing, and the kind of margin that you can make on it, EBITDA margin and the PAT margin? Ballpark figures.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Go ahead. Yeah. So I'm saying that these sales are internal. So again, you know, we are not reporting any numbers on them right now, but obviously, you know, we target, again, on a transfer pricing basis, a certain margin that we charge to these businesses. But then eventually everything gets capitalized. So it gets... You know, we get a, we basically capitalize a lower cost because in consolidation, everything gets knocked off.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
Right. Right.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
But I think to your question-
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
Do you make higher, like, high teen EBITDA margin or mid-teen or, say, low-teen EBITDA margin, kind of? Any idea on that, that you can give us?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
See, we are targeting around, you know, a certain margin which is lesser than 10%, because it's all internal captive. But I'll tell you what. See, the question is that, for us, the margin on the transfer pricing doesn't really matter because as Kailash said, it gets consolidated, right? What we are, however, doing is--what we are, however, doing is we will be starting at some point in the near future, to start reporting the P&L of the solar manufacturing business separately, assuming A, an arm's length transfer pricing between the two businesses. Okay?
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
Right.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
So that's something that we're going to start doing at some point in the future.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
Right, and, sorry, one more point on this one. The EBITDA margin, as you said, you would like to keep it below 10%. So would it be somewhat equivalent in the external sales as well, or would it differ materially?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
No, of course, it will, you know, be very opportunistic in those cases. No, it does differ materially.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
Right.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
It does differ materially. Yeah. Yeah.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
Right. Right. Got that. And, I mean, any visibility on the capacity that you have to put out for IOCL JV on green hydrogen?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
No, not yet. Simply because, you know, that bid has to happen. I mean, various bids have to happen that we'll have to win first, and then we'll have to see, based on that, how much capacity we need to allocate for that JV.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
Right. Right. Got that. Yeah. Those were my questions. Thank you.
Operator (participant)
Your next question comes from Puneet Gulati with HSBC. Puneet Gulati, your line is open.
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
Yeah, thank you. Thank you for the follow-up. My question is, if you can talk a bit about your experience with respect to the recently commissioned solar and wind plants, in terms of what kind of [inaudible] you are experiencing there, both for wind and the solar?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
So on solar, Puneet, there's been no issue in that the LPS are even for the older projects, and for obviously therefore the newer projects as well, are pretty much in line with what we had assumed. As far as when PLFs on newer projects is concerned, you know, the projects that we've commissioned now, these forecasts were made four years, five years ago, when we were following a little bit more the older methodology, which we have subsequently changed. Okay? So-
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
Okay.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
But also what's happened is the machine types have changed a lot, because these are the machines.
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
Right.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
The machines that we're now commissioning are three plus megawatt machines with much higher hub heights and so on. So the PLFs of these new machines are therefore higher. But we don't have enough of a-
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
Yes, that's what I want to understand. In the real-life scenario, what are these PLFs?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
So you see, we'll have to wait for a whole year to finish before we can assess, but in general, the PLFs of these new machines would have been at least 10%-15% higher than the older machines, just given the nature, the more sophistication of these machines and their higher megawatt and structural configuration.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
So we should be expecting a higher PLF, but you know, we'll have to wait for the whole year to finish before we can conclude anything, whether that delta was finally delivered or not delivered. I mean, the reality is that these machines are definitely performing at a higher PLF than the older machines.
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
Okay. And the same apply for solar modules as well?
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Solar modules, to be honest, I haven't, again, tracked that particular data, whether in fact the new modules are giving higher PLFs or not. So let me get back to you on that.
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
Okay. Great.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
I mean, the fact is that a lot of the new projects are now bifacials, so, you know, they will therefore definitely give a higher PLF.
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
Correct. So that's the delta I'm trying to understand, how big that delta is.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Yeah. So, you know, we'll have to. We can't just give you an off-the-cuff feedback. We'll have to look at the performance over at least a year, and then we'll have to also look at you know, the difference in location from location, and then sort of do some analysis and conclude what exactly the difference is.
Puneet Gulati (Director of Equity Research)
Right. Thanks. That's all. Thank you so much.
Operator (participant)
Your next question comes from Macauley Smith with Ninety One.
Macauley Smith (Emerging Markets Credit)
Hi, thanks for taking my question. I know you answered earlier on briefly on the receivables, but could you just add a bit more color? Because during the quarter, it seemed like there was an increase in both receivables and payables, particularly on the receivables, as we were assuming improved collections. And looking at the same period last year, we don't necessarily see the same seasonality.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Yeah. So see, as far as the payables are concerned, it's a function of, you know, the CapEx program, and, you know, some payments would have become due on account of, you know, the investments that we are making. And those, you know, keep getting cleared off. You know, sometimes the customer may give us a credit period and, you know, they'll take an LC, they may discount it.
Amit Bhinde (Equity Analyst)
Because of that, you know, there will be payables which may show up. As far as receivables is concerned, you know, yes, there has been an increase, which has happened quarter on quarter, but again, year on year, there's been an improvement. So last year it was a hundred and fourteen days, this year it is, you know, below or around eighty days or thereabout.
So as I said earlier, you know, it's mostly on account of, you know, the fact that, you know, this is the first quarter, the revenue, you know. You calculate DSO on the basis of trailing twelve months revenue. So again, you know, first quarter being lesser revenue, there will be some impact on account of that, because receivables are largely constant.
But as I also I'll reiterate that, you know, there is no significant impact that we are seeing, or any delays that we are seeing with any of the offtakers. All of them have been fairly prompt in making their payments, which are due to us.
Macauley Smith (Emerging Markets Credit)
Okay, thank you. And then my second question was just on the recent tap for the 2026 bonds. If you could just add any color on the purpose of those proceeds.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
So it is again, you know, for, you know, repaying some other debt within the system. So it is largely being done, for that purpose.
Macauley Smith (Emerging Markets Credit)
Thank you. Those were all my questions.
Sumant Sinha (CEO)
Thank you.
Operator (participant)
There are no further questions at this time. That does conclude our conference for today. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect.